


T0PH4T'S Snip Thread

by TopHat



Category: Parahumans Series - Wildbow
Genre: Age Swap, Dorky Singing, F/F, F/M, Fertility Issues, Finding Mentors in Odd Places, Gen, Manipulation, Mpreg, Still works tho, The Talk, stuffed animals, tinder dates
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-20
Updated: 2020-05-02
Packaged: 2021-03-01 01:20:34
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 7,067
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23236852
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TopHat/pseuds/TopHat
Summary: For uncategorized snippets that don't fit more cleanly into other categories.
Relationships: Lily | Flechette | Foil/Sabah | Parian, Rebecca Costa-Brown | Alexandria/Fortuna | Contessa, Rebecca Costa-Brown | Alexandria/Kenta | Lung
Comments: 1
Kudos: 28





	1. It's Just a Prank, Bro

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Amy runs into her not-really-sister at a convention.

Every second that went by, Amy was longer into her lunch break and closer to the Q&A panel. The panel where she'd have to smile, to lie, to pretend like everything was fine. Every second brought her closer to the end of the convention, the end of the request for a piece of New Wave merch signed by the greatest healer in the world. She had finished her sandwich within five minutes, Vicky had left shortly after that. Now Amy was stuck, caught by the clock, somewhere between dozing and hypnotized, simply enjoying the lull.  
  
“Whatcha doing?”  
  
“Nothing!” Amy replied, spine shooting straight as she sat up. “Nothing,” she repeated, more quietly. “Just thinking.”  
  
“That sounds boring,” Victoria stated frankly, sitting down into the chair next to Amy. “Mind if I think with you?”  
  
“Why would you want to do something boring?” Amy muttered, slowly slumping deeper into her seat.  
  
Vicky shrugged. “One girl’s trash is another girl’s treasure. Besides.” She nudged Amy’s arm, sending a shiver through the other girl. “I know you don’t like the meet and greet stuff. I wanted to check up on you.”  
  
“Thanks,” Amy said quietly. A comfortable silence stretched out between them.  
  
“How do you do it?” Amy asked, staring at the table.  
  
“Hmm?” Victoria look to the side, the picture of innocent confusion.  
  
“You like being a cape. I can kind of get that.” Amy began to trace lines between the flakes of foil in the table, creating aimless constellations. “You get to fly, to beat up the bad guys, to live out the dream of being Alexandria. But you also like this part. Talking to people, answering questions, all the publicity stuff Carol drags us along to in the name of ‘spreading the message’.” Amy’s hand paused. “You’re like a star, getting everyone caught up in your orbit, and you don’t even notice it.”  
  
Another silence stretched out, this one less amiable.  
  
“One reason I’m good at this stuff is because I practice,” Victoria said the words carefully, as if each one was a glass matchstick that needed to be stacked just so. “I read everything I can get my hands on, spend hours perfecting the flashy moves, write pages of notes on each and every aspect of capeing.” Each argument stacked upon the other, forming a tower, an explanation, an excuse.  
  
“The other reason is because yeah, I like it.” Vicky leaned back, bringing one knee up to her chest and wrapping her arms around it. “The people I love need someone to keep them up to date, and when they come back safe after a mission I know it’s partially because of me. Being a cape also helps,” Victoria added, a smile entering her voice. “It’s kind of hard to hate yourself.”  
  
“Not that hard,” Amy said, fingers tensing. “People hate themselves all the time.”  
  
“And it’s considered a problem,” Victoria replied evenly. “They have a whole field of science dedicated to helping people who hate themselves, and they’re getting better at helping them all the time.” She paused for a moment. “Ames, is there anything you want to talk about?”  
  
Amy shook her head and withdrew her hand to her robe.  
  
Victoria looked at her sister.  
  
Then she slung an arm around Amy and pulled.  
  
“Vicky!” Amy squeaked, balance failing her as she fell out of her chair and into Victoria’s lap, limbs askew. A short bit of rearranging later and she seated comfortably on top of Victoria’s thighs, awkwardly leaning into her sister’s chest for balance.  
  
“Nope,” Victoria said. “Something’s on your mind. You don’t have to tell me, but it’s eating at you and I want to know.”  
  
“Vickyyy,” Amy whined, shoving her hands in deeper into her costume, trapped by Victoria’s hug, blood rushing to her face. “Please.”  
  
“Tough,” Victoria replied, nuzzling down into Amy’s hair. “Now out with it.” Her nose pressed against Amy’s scalp, flooding her brain with information, communicating the motion of trillions of cells, all moving in perfect concert, dying and being reborn, dying faster than they could reproduce, and certainly not Vicky.  
  
Amy froze, muscles seizing up at the sudden strangeness. The imposter pulled its head up slowly, clicking its fake tongue.  
  
“Damn, you figured it out,” the imposter said, disappointed.  
  
“Who the fuck are you?” Amy whispered.  
  
The door behind Amy and the imposter clicked open. “Ames, I’m back with friends and cake!” Slowly, Amy turned around.  
  
Victoria stood there, smiling like the sun itself, armed with a cardboard box and a water bottle. Behind her stood two men, one an albino dressed in deep purple velvet, the other a bare-chested, muscular individual with a goat mask. The latter waved. “Hi, me.”  
  
“Hi, me,” the imposter said, sending Amy’s heart into her stomach. “How’s it going?”  
  
“Pretty well, pretty well,” the goat-headed man replied, nodding peaceably and never dropping his smile. He turned to Amy, eyes sparkling with mirth. “I see you forgot to tell this little girl that we were coming.”  
  
“How could I? She’s just so cute!” the imposter moaned, squeezing the hug a little tighter. Amy could sense the blood moving under her own skin, knew that a biological reaction was taking place, but inside her head all she could feel was cold. “She just makes you want to hug her!”  
  
“Eww, that’s my sister you’re glomping,” the real Victoria said, making a face as she moved to sit across from Amy, who couldn’t move with all the ice in her limbs. “With my body and a twenty-something year-old mind. You’re being weird, Satyr.”  
  
“Maybe I like it weird,” the goat man replied, taking a seat at the table and making eye contact with Amy. “I know weirdness pretty well, as could a lot of people, given half the chance.”  
  
“My full name is Satyrical, by the way,” the imposter said. “I can make clones that look like other people, and I was supposed to give you the heads up that Vicky would be arriving late. That hasn’t happened yet.”  
  
“She’s here, by the way,” the other Satyrical said, winking once and smiling wide. “And you seem to be enjoying the flirting well enough,” he added, drumming his fingers on the table, a tuneless rhythm of silent patterns.  
  
Amy stared back and tried very, very hard to keep the mask on.  
  
“He really needs to learn to double check ages though,” the purple cape chided, sitting down next to Satyrical. “Now stop coming onto the minor. We don’t need you to force us all into another workplace harassment seminar.”  
  
Satyrical lifted his arms in surrender even as the imposter did the same, leaving Amy on its lap of her own free will. “What can I say? Taboos are interesting, and you never know what could come from sharing them. Good things, even.”  
  
Amy stood, turned in place, and walked out the door.


	2. A Proclimation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> With Scion dead, Fortuna decides to break out into song and dance.

“I can’t believe it,” Rebecca said, staring at the golden corpse. “He just... died.”  
  
“We still have to be careful, he could reanimate at any moment,” Doctor Mother warned, pushing the trolley through the sterile hallways of the compound. “He doesn’t need to resort to any elaborate ruses, but we’ve never understood his psychology well enough to say whether or not he wouldn’t try one anyway.”  
  
“I know that,” Rebecca replied, pushing open the door to the experimentation room. “I just-”  
  
And then the world stopped making sense.  
  
Instead of a nice, clean laboratory, with a fully-prepared surgical theatre ready to receive quite possibly the most important cadaver in history, there was a stage. A nice one, with a back board painted to resemble a Parisian cityscape, and single fedora-wearing figure in front of it. Contessa looked at her two new guests, strummed an idle note on the electric guitar strung around her neck, the nodded once.  
  
“Hit it,” she muttered.  
  
The room went dark. The door closed. A spotlight came on, isolating the thinker of near-unimaginable power. Rebecca’s mind raced as she scanned the other woman’s body language, trying to figure out what this could be path to, what Contessa’s ulterior motive could possibly be, whether she had been masted. The war was over, they had won, all they needed to do was the clean up, so what was-  
  
[A beat started up](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=otXGqU4LBEI) and Contessa started plucking at strings, filling the air with gentle thunder as an invisible drum started up.  
  
 _“When I wake up, well I know I'm gonna be, I'm gonna be the one who wakes up next you.”_  
  
Rebecca’s mind stopped.  
  
What?  
  
 _“When I go out, yeah I know I'm gonna be, I'm gonna be the one who goes along with you.”_  
  
No seriously, what alternate universe had she stepped into.  
  
 _“If I need help, well I know I'm gonna be, I'm gonna be askin’ for some help from you. And if I lose hope, yeah I know I'm gonna be, I'm gonna be gettin’ hope from you.”_  
  
“Doctor, what’s going on?” Rebecca muttered, looking at the only other witness to the madness taking place on stage. The older woman was sniffling, dabbing at her eyes.  
  
“They grow up so fast,” she said quietly. “I thought I had a few more years with her, but when the little bird wants to leave the nest you really don’t have a choice in the matter.”  
  
“What do you mean, grow up fast, and what do you mean ‘leave the nest’?” Rebecca hissed, pushing the stretcher with the alien corpse out of the way.  
  
“Contessa never had a chance at a normal childhood,” Doctor Mother explained, eyes still locked on the stage. “She never had a chance to learn how to interact with other children normally, so I read her stories.  
  
“How does that translate to-” Rebecca started.  
  
 _“Because I would take 500 steps,”_ Contessa shouted, the desperate hope suffusing the words and cutting through Rebecca’s astonishment. _“And I would take 500 more Just to be the woman who walks a thousand steps on the path up to your door.”_  
  
“It took me three years to realize the reason she didn’t like David was because she thought he had cooties,” Doctor Mother said, shaking her head. “Since then I’ve tried aging up the books she reads, but I took it in the wrong direction.”  
  
 _“When I'm working, yes I know I'm gonna be, I'm gonna be a woman who's working hard for you. And once I’m finished, I know that every night, I’ll be teleporting back home to you.”_ Contessa took her hand away from the guitar for long enough to snap a single finger gun at Rebecca, which she instinctively turned to avoid.  
  
“Did you give her Atlas Shrugged or something?” Rebecca asked, giving the performing woman and odd look. “Why is she singing an odd cover of the Proclaimers?”  
  
“I gave her Mrs. Dalloway,” Doctor Mother murmured. “And I suspect she’s in love.”  
  
 _"When I walk my path (down the lonely road it is) I know I'm gonna be, I'm gonna be the one who paths back home to you. When I walk my path (down the lonely road it is) I know I'm gonna be, I'm gonna be the one who paths back home to you.”_ Rebecca shook her head, unable to look away from the passion under the lights. She could see where Contessa was reaching, where she was where the other woman was a shade less perfect than her usual actions. It was almost as if she was trying to impress someone, but who was here to impress? Just the Custodian (who had to be playing the drums and managing the lights), Doctor Mother (who didn’t need impressing) and Rebecca.  
  
“How does a novel about twenty four hours in post World War One London make her do this?” Rebecca asked. "Also, why would start with Mrs. Dalloway? Why not Pride and Prejudice? Why not Frankenstien? Why not Milton? Does the chronology of English literature mean nothing to you?"  
  
 _“Because I would take 500 steps,”_ Contessa whispered, volume falling as the light dimmed. _“And I would take 500 more.”_ The was a vulnerability there, as alien as a blue rose, and it made Rebecca wondered how much of Fortuna she had actually seen over the years. _“Just to be the woman who walks a thousand steps on the path up to your door.”_  
  
“Apparently she took the path to understanding the book instead of reading it normally,” Doctor Mother said as Contessa went into a guitar solo, ignoring the questioning of her teaching method. “And what she got out of it is that heterosexual relationships were inherently toxic except when they weren’t, but if you slept with people of the same sex it was always okay.”  
  
“That misses so much of the story though,” Rebecca said, momentarily snapped out of her trance, enraged by the overly-simplistic reading of such a piece of literature. “What about the conflicting goals of each viewpoint character? What about the nature of London through each of their eyes? What about-”  
  
“Nope, she just got the gay,” Doctor Mother said, shaking her head. “Now hush, she’s starting up again.”  
  
 _“When I'm lonely, well I know I'm gonna be, I'm gonna be the one who's lonely without you.”_ Dammit, why was she looking right at Rebecca? Was Rebecca giving off tells, feeding the other woman information? Maybe Contessa was trying to look at Doctor Mother and Rebecca was in the way. She stepped to the side, but those green lenses followed Rebecca, making odd flutter float through her chest. That couldn’t be right, her heart had been timelocked years ago. Why was it beating so fast? _“And when I'm dreaming, well I know I'm gonna dream,_ _I'm gonna dream myself a path right back to you.”_ It’d be easier to focus on the song if Contessa wasn’t staring straight at her, why did she have to make it weird?  
  
 _“When I go out (when I go out) well I know I'm gonna be, I'm gonna be makin’ the world better all for you.”_ Contessa stepped off the stage, light slowly tracking. Another lamp flicked on, shining down on Rebecca and making her shrink at the sudden attention. _“When I walk my path (down the lonely road it is) I know I'm gonna be, I'm gonna be the one who paths back home to you.”_ She kept walking forward, towards the frozen Rebecca, still playing. _“Because I would take 500 steps, And I would take 500 more, Just to be the woman who walks a thousand steps on the path up to your door.”_  
  
The drums faded into silence leaving the two woman staring at one another in a pool of light, silent.  
  
“I would really like to kiss you now,” Contessa murmured.  
  
Rebecca blinked.  
  
Contessa, no, _Fortuna_ , leaned in-


	3. Bacchanal Birthing

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lung and Alexandria search for fertility assistance.

Allie walked a lot of fine lines in her daily life. She could call people up to say hi, but not so often that it became weird (more than once a day was weird). She could suggest some ideas to people, but not more radical or out there than they themselves would come up with (apparently make a womb to vomit hand sanitizer was not a good way to ensure sterility in an ER). Firm hugs and kisses on the cheeks were okay, but groping and tongue were not (unless you were in a relationship with them and then only behind closed doors, but when you went out and said you wanted to have sex with someone you’d just met most people would say no because of no good reasons Allie could see).  
  
That extended into her work as well. Self-replicating organisms, ones that could go exponential, were scary enough that the time she’d tried to make a Gibblet model which could restore environmental stability to the forest around her Wurm Legend dropped by, broke her toys, and told her never to do it again. She could’ve turned them off any time she wanted, just _boop_ and _splat_ in a chain reaction of biomass neutralization, but it was kind of cool watching one of the more powerful heroes cut loose on a horde of fleshy hug bots. Nonetheless Allie liked not being a grease smear on the ground, so she got one of the talkie-people to tell her what was and wasn’t okay, mostly obeyed the rules, and only occasionally invited people to parties via flesh pigeons.  
  
That said Allie also knew she wasn’t perfect, so when she dilated open the Wurm’s entrance sphincter to find Lung and Alexandria waiting outside her first reaction was, “Did the algae cause a plague again?”  
  
“This is not a business visit,” Alexandria said, looking Allie straight in the eye. Lung’s gaze dropped a little to Allie’s chest, the came back up in a firmly neutral expression. It was an impressive (if disappointing) show of self control, and Allie sighed internally. ‘Not business’ inevitably meant favors, which gave her not-hard currency to spend but which wasn’t really cumulative or equivalent to the favor she’d give. Knocking out a villain didn’t turn into a blowjob which didn’t turn into getting DNA samples which didn’t turn into getting access to the tinkertech from people who knew what they were doing like Lab Rat or Grotesquerie. Really, what was even the point of favors if they couldn't make people do what you want?  
  
It was a necessary part of the social game however, so Allie put on a smile and stepped to the side, motioning to the pulsating interior of the Wurm. “Well, if it’s not a problem then it can wait for tea. Come in, why don’t you? Do you guys like tea, coffee, juice, amniotic fluids, warm blood, cold blood—”  
  
“I will take a green tea,” Lung said curtly, stepping into the wet, meaty tunnel, down towards the Living Room (really convenient because there were three other areas he could’ve gone towards and the Breeding, Palpitation, and Reprocessing Rooms were all Not Ideal for entertaining guests). He didn’t seem to pay attention to the slight _schlorping_ of his feet on the meaty floor, and Allie’s disappointment rose. The stoic one were always the most fun when you got them going.  
  
“I’ll... pass,” Alexandria said, floating behind the other man. “Thank you for the offer.”  
  
Allie shrugged, closed the entrance sphincter, and followed them into the depths of her home.

* * *

Once they were all seated and happy (on real, non-living couches, because apparently people didn’t like automatically adjusting seats which were strictly superior to cotton pillows in every way), Allie put down her pustule of nutrient juice and looked at the floating heroine and bored-looking villain. “So, what do you want?”  
  
“We would like to request assistance with—”  
  
“Impregnate me.”  
  
Alexandria spun around to glare at Lung, who ignored the look and idly swirling his boring ceramic cup of tea.  
  
Allie considered the statement, sucking at the teat of her Beverage Pustle (which remain heated, adjusted the ratio of tea/water saturation automatically, and replenished itself using the oils and fluids secreted by it’s holder and the moisture in the air unlike the piece of dried dirt in Lung’s hand). “Normally people don’t like it when I knock them up.”  
  
“Normally people do not ask you to,” Lung replied, placing his cup down on the table. To his credit he didn’t react when a strand of Beverage Intestine curled up from under the table to refill it, and even picked the cup back up.  
  
“My body wouldn’t take the embryo,” Alexandria said, finally settling down on the couch next to Lung. “Three independent Thinkers confirmed it, and while we could adopt both Kenta and I...”  
  
Lung placed and hand on Alexandria’s knee, eye softening. “We would like one of our own.”  
  
Allie notably _didn’t_ say anything about how she could make some adopted children one of their own (she’d be telling Johnathan about that on Thursday [if this meeting wasn’t supposed to be confidential {things with the Triumvirate tended to be weird like that}]). Instead, she nodded sympathetically, pasting on a smile which Jonathan had told her was ‘nice but not too flirty.’ “So... how much control do you want to exercise over the child?”  
  
Alexandria looked up from her handholding to Allie, eyes unreadable behind the visor. “I’m sorry what?”  
  
Allie shrugged, tossing the Beverage Pustule over one shoulder, where the Worm would reprocess it into the walls after a few minutes. “I mean, ‘make me preggers’ is a pretty broad statement. I could give you a remote-controlled drone, semi-sentient pet, hypercognitive parasite which births more hypercognitive parasites, a fleshy hybrid of the two of you with which to spawn a species of strictly-superior people who can fly, shoot fire, and endure small arms fire with impunity—”  
  
“A conventional child,” Lung said.  
  
Allie dropped her head. “So boring.”  
  
For a while they with only the faint _squish_ of the Wurm around them.  
  
“If you can’t do it—” Alexandria started.  
  
Allie’s head jerked up. “What no I can totally do it. I just need to scan you both, grow a fetal symbiont that’s compatible with him, and insert it in a non-essential region to grow. Two days, tops, for the product, and nine months for the birth. Less if I can modify the uterine sac to take advantage of his healing factor.”  
  
“Okay then,” Alexandria said slowly, turn her head towards Lung. The concealed half of her face made reading expressions difficult, but Allie was pretty sure Alexandria was surprised and happy. Lung was as impassive as ever, but the squeeze he gave Alexandria’s hand seemed to imply he was happy too. “Thank you?”  
  
Allie waved her hand dismissively, standing up and stretching in a firecracker chain of _pops_. No matter how many tuneups she gave her new selves, sitting down for too long always managed to make her sore. “You can thank me by letting me insert the parasite in the fun way. Thanks for the visit, and I’ll have it done by Wednesday.”  
  
“Don’t you need—” Lung began.  
  
“I got DNA from your travel through the hallway and scanned her as soon as you came in,” Allie interrupted, opening the tunnel to the entrance sphincter. “I wasn’t going to use them until I got a yes, but I figured this would save everyone some time and energy.” When the two parahumans didn’t move Allie frowned. “I mean, I can give them back if you want.”  
  
“I think it’d be best if we left.” Alexandria floated off the couch, and Lung moved behind her. “Thank you for your hospitality.”  
  
“Sure thing!” Allie watched them leave, and once she was sure no strangers had snuck into the Worm during the conversation she opened a tunnel to the Breeding room and let her mind unspool, reconnecting to the network of white matter and leveling most of her mental resources to the complicated question of giving a man with an escalating healing factor a normal, human pregnancy.  
  
The rest began to imagine the arguments it would take to convince the couple that coitus was the optimal transmission medium.


	4. Drops of Tea and Sugar

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ward!Rebecca does household chores for MiddleAge!Taylor after outing herself.

When Rebecca moved to Brockton Bay, she didn’t think much of it. Nazis, sex slavers, and it seemed like no one was trying to make it better. She was shocked when someone shot at her for the first time, an action which would’ve brought the wrath of God down on anyone who dared in Los Angeles but was apparently a depressingly common situation in the single closest thing to Gotham City she’d yet seen. The guy who had done it even managed to dodge attempt murder, claiming knowledge of her brute rating and taking a plea deal to get free.  
  
The warehouse they raided was empty, and when they went to get answers the perp was long gone.  
  
Rebecca kicked a stone down the road. Softly. Property damage was the number one way to lose the public’s trust, and in Brockton Bay they were already operating at a deficit. Armsmaster knew how to look good for the camera, knew how to play a crowd, but no one was a good enough spin doctor to make a city where the felon voting bloc could swing elections trust the establishment. It’d been one of the reasons she’d asked to be reassigned. The Elite excepted LA was doing pretty well, and Rebecca had wanted to do the most good. Besides, how bad could a city of three hundred some thousand actually get?  
  
Rebecca gave the rock a little more oomph in frustration and watched it soar off into the distance.  
  
The answer was horrible.  
  
“Nice kick.”  
  
Rebecca whirled around. A woman stared back at her impassively, cool green eyes appraising. She was kneeling besides a plot of dirt, black hair stuck up in a bun and mouth set into a firmly neutral expression. “You should be a bit more careful. Anyone can be watching.”  
  
“You need to come with me,” Rebecca said, hand shooting to her side and dragging out her phone. “The PRT has a form for you to sign, a procedure-”  
  
Rebecca yelped as a fly flew down her throat, both hands flying to her throat in a desperate attempt to dislodge the creature. After a moment of hacking coughs, she started scraping at her tongue. “Grossgrossgrossgrossgross-”  
  
“So this is what Wards look like these days.” When Rebecca looked up the woman had her phone in hand, and a distinctly disappointed look on her face. She clicked the power button on the top and stood up, far taller than she’d looked while working among the weeds. “Come with me.”  
  
Rebecca shook her head, stepping back and make a face at the persistent taste of bug guts. “No, no, no. You come with me, or I come back with a PRT van and we figure things out the hard way.”  
  
The woman paused, then sighed. “Two bees are about to land on your neck.”  
  
Moments later Rebecca felt the tickle of little legs on her pulse, and even knowing that she could take small arms fire a shiver ran through her.  
  
The woman pulled open an old screen door, then motioned at her house. “I’ve shown you mine, you’ve shown me yours. We trade names, details, mutually assured destruction. But you don’t call the PRT.”  
  
Rebecca pulled herself up to her full height and shifted her body language, PR manuals and intimidation techniques flickering through her head and coalescing into a visage that had made people freeze in terror. “I don’t think you’re in a position to make demands.”  
  
“While we were talking I sent an email to a holding account. If I don’t send the all-clear in two hours your physical description will be sent to an agent for distribution across half a dozen dark web media platforms that Dragon doesn’t know about. I think it’s you who aren’t in a position to make demands.” The woman stared back, and Rebecca couldn’t see a hint of fear in her. “Try me.”  
  
Rebecca searched for the slightest sign that the woman was bluffing, that she hadn’t just gotten snookered, and found nothing but confidence.  
  
After a moment, Rebecca turned away. “Why?”  
  
A sigh echoed across the street. “To make a point. Now come on. I have cookies.”  
  


* * *

  
  
The following weeks were... weird.  
  
Rebecca didn’t report her breach of cover to the PRT. That had been part of the deal. Hypercognition came with hypercontrol of microexpressions, and the anti-Master thing she had meant Dean couldn’t read her emotions. At some point she was going to have to try to talk to the people in charge of Watchdog about accounting for capes like her, but that day was not today.  
  
After school wrapped up, Rebecca would walk home. Dennis’s house was roughly in the same direction, so they’d walk together. Rebecca got the impression that he was kind of into her but he hadn’t made a move yet so she just let that sit. Maybe not the bravest thing to do, but Alexandria was the one who took gunshots. Rebecca could be a little meeker.  
  
Besides, he was too skinny.  
  
Now Carlos...  
  
“Wipe that look off your face and help me with these weeds.” The command brought Rebecca back to reality. Taylor was kneeling by some peonies, pulling up little bits of grass. After a moment, she turned around and glared at Rebecca.  
  
“Coming,” Rebecca said, dashing across the street and tossing her backpack to the hanging couch on the front porch.  
  
Taylor had said that exchanging their identities would be mutually assured destruction. On the other hand, Taylor had also pointed out that she could dump Rebecca’s identity and disappear, while the reverse did not hold true. She also pointed out that there were numerous tasks that a forty-year-old woman may have some difficulty with, and if Rebecca would be kind enough to supplement her capering with out-of-costume deeds those deeds would be rewarded with out-of-costume baked goods. Stick, then carrot, and every time Rebecca tried to read Taylor all she got was detached confidence.  
  
Rebecca figured that Taylor was just lonely and didn’t know how to ask people to have tea and cookies with her like a normal human being.  
  
Rebecca fixed the front step, weeded like a fiend, and got a crash-course on how pipes and cars worked. In return she got to sample the baked goods Taylor made, the different types of honey the bees in her backyard made, and a uselessly broad selection of teas. The food would always be arranged just so once they were done, and after the snacks were consumed Taylor would politely ask Rebecca’s opinion on the food before letting her go free.  
  
It took Rebecca a bit to realize that the silences on the back porch while they ate were awkward, and then another few silences to realize that Taylor was waiting for her to open up a dialogue. Why the woman who had more or less blackmailed her into compliance was expecting Rebecca to be a sterling conversationalist was beyond her, but when she took a step back from microexpressions and just thought about what Taylor did and didn’t say it got a lot more clear.  
  
So the fifth time Rebecca talked about what she saw on patrol.  
  
It was uncomfortable. Brockton Bay was a shitty place filled with shitty things, and talking about them wasn’t fun. Perfect memory made school easy, but it also made leaving work at work hard. She’d be walking around, laughing with Missy while they perused the Boardwalk for sales, and a blouse that a girl in an alleyway had been wearing would leap out at her from a nearby department store window. It wouldn't mean anything, just cloth in a window, but it brought the memory of broken skin, swollen bruises, and blood, skin and bone so much like her own and yet not and suddenly Rebecca would need to go home and snuggle some stuffed animals she probably should’ve grown out of and needed to be careful with because she never stopped being super strong and when you were super strong hugs could turn into torn skin spilling stuffing everywhere and tons of broken needles from trying to fix the tears which was even more difficult when you it was easier to snap a needle than thread it but you kept at it because Mr. Snufflekins was a good friend who deserved the effort and eventually he'd get better even though the elephant would never quite be the same again she still _loved_ him the same and that had to be what mattered.  
  
"Right?" Rebecca asked.  
  
The day after she'd explained that, Taylor gave her a stuffed spider.  
  
“This one won’t break,” Taylor said.  
  
It didn’t.


	5. The Salmon that Climbed the Waterfall

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Legend gives graduating!Ward Kenta The Talk.

Samuel stood before the door, listening to the sound of masculine shouting and esoteric sound effects, trying to think through how he’d approach this Ward. Well, not quite a Ward. The official graduation ceremony would take a while to set up, both because of logistical obstacles with renting space in New York and to confuse amateur cape spotters who thought that releasing Protectorate ID’s constituted civil disobedience. Kenta had turned eighteen more a few months ago, but if previous graduations had proven anything it had been that the graduates would always feel like Wards to Samuel.  
  
He sighed.  
  
The awkwardness of this particular talk also never changed.  
  
Samuel knocked twice on the door. “Kenta? Can we talk?”  
  
The noises quieted a fraction, then stopped. Cloth rustled, and voice said, “Come in.”  
  
Samuel pushed into the dorm. As Ward personal quarters went, this one looked surprisingly clean. A hamper held the dirty laundry, the desk stood with papers in one corner and writing utensils in the next, and the walls had only a few of Lung’s own posters decorating them. The TV in the corner had a cartoon on it, with a pair of blond, heavily-muscled men paused mid-brawl.  
  
Kenta himself was lying back on his bed, in jeans and a graphic tee with one of the animated men on it with the caption ‘Guess my power level now!’ sketched out below it. “Legend.”  
  
Samuel waved his hand, closing the door behind him. No one else needed to hear this. “I’m here in an official capacity, but not as Legend.” He looked around for a second, scratching the back of his head, then pointed at the office chair by the desk. “Can I...”  
  
Kenta motioned with one hand. “As you will.”  
  
Samuel collapsed into the seat, closing his eyes and leaning back in the chair. “Thank you.”  
  
For a few seconds they both sat there in silence.  
  
Kenta coughed.  
  
Samuel dragged in a breath, then slowly sat up. Once up right he opened his eyes, looked Kenta dead in the eye, and asked, “How many times have you had sex with a fan?”  
  
Kenta’s impassive expression broke. “Wha—”  
  
“The correct answer is ‘zero,’ by the way.” Samuel crossed his legs and started rubbing at the rapidly-approaching headache, staring at the ground.  
  
This was going to be a rough one.  
  
“In the event you have a relationship with an individual in you cape persona, you will of course report the incident to the Director of your local branch immediately, and you will inform the Director of the identity of any and all paramours who might have access to material which could compromise your identity. If any one attempts to sway your decision on anything using sexual favors, you are to refuse, firmly and clearly, and when convenient report the incident to a PRT director. In the event the source has parahuman abilities, assume your libido is compromised and act directly against it. Masters are nothing to play around with, and—”  
  
“This is a joke.” Kenta’s shock had transitioned in anger, all tight lips and narrowed eyes. “Hazing. A trial for the new hero.”  
  
Samuel shook his head. “Half the people I talk to say the same thing. They’re all wrong. Every single Ward needs to receive the same speech, every single single Ward needs to hear it from a parahuman who has had substantial experience with a relationship, and a parahuman who has maintained one for longer than a few years.”  
  
He looked up blearily at Kenta. “Guess how many people that is?”  
  
Kenta inhaled, held the breath, then exhaled. Slowly.  
  
“I am willing to listen,” he said, each word carefully enunciated, even as his eyes began to glaze over.  
  
Samuel nodded, pinching the bridge of his nose. “I’ll make it as painless as possible.”  
  
“Now, while the PRT has a massive bowl of free condoms in both the male, female, and sex neutral bathroom, that does not mean we wish for people to have sex there. Instead, it is to facilitate the anonymous acquisition of effective birth control. This is not the only way to acquire birth control, and it is highly recommended that you and your partner look for additional measures. Note that this does _not_ mean that you should wear multiple condoms at once, nor does it mean that male and female condoms should be used in conjunction with one another...”  
  


* * *

  
  
What felt like an eternity later, Samuel finally stopped talking. It took a few seconds for Kenta to realize the torrent of words had stopped, and even longer for him to react. “Is that it?”  
  
Samuel glared balefully at Kenta. “Do you want more?”  
  
Kenta lifted his hands defensively. “I only wanted to assure myself things had ended.”  
  
“Yes, they have, and if anyone asks I have educated you more thoroughly than the Reproductive Health Provision ever required.” Samuel stood up, shaking his head. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I need to do my best to forget that I have that speech memorized until the next Ward comes of age.” He paused at the door and looked back. “If you need me for something relationship-based, my door is open. I do want to remind you, however, that we have a well-staffed medical wing on-base, and that every single nurse there knows more about birth control than I do. So _please_ , _carefully consider who you seek out_.”  
  
Once had Samuel slammed the door behind him, Rebecca drifted down from the ceiling. “I’m glad I never have to give those speeches. It was all I could do not to burst out laughing when he started listing off all the reasons brute ratings in bed weren’t what they’re cracked up to be.”  
  
Kenta dropped his head into his hands. “I was certain we’d be found out when your bra shook off.” A second passed, and he looked up. “Also, impressive flexibility.”  
  
Rebecca wiggled her eyebrows suggestively and lifted her right leg straight up. Dangling from her toes was the black, lacy garment, and with a flick of near-impossibly dexterous digits the item landed on Kenta’s head, obscuring one eye with a generous cup. “There’s a lot of things you don’t know about me, dragon boy. Why don’t you lose the shirt, put back on that cartoon, and we can work our way back to where we were before the homosexual agenda showed up?”  
  
Cloth tore, masculine yelling resumed, and brown met olive in a wave of heat and lust.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A gift for TheSleepingKnight, from the prompt "Lily's Attempts at Dating."

“You know you could get any girl you want, right?”

“Fat chance.”

“I’m serious! Track team, good personality, good looks, gay-A’s—”

“Gay A’s?”

“Listen, I can’t say straight when you’re in the conversation.”

“Fuck you.”

“No, no you won’t.”

“...”

“...”

“...”

“Okay, that was too far. My bad.”

“Yes it was.”

“...”

“...”

“Will you forgive me?”

“Yes. You’re forgiven.”

“Excellent. Will you then permit me for setting up a Tinder profile for you?”

“No.”

“Well in that case I’m going to have to ask for forgiveness again.”

“Why are we friends?”

“Because we’re roommates, and being enemies isn’t a long-term viable option.”

“In other words, by circumstance.”

“Isn’t that how all friendships work?”

***

“You’re Missy Byron?”

“Yeah. You’re Lily?”

“Yup. Nice to meet you.”

“...”

“...”

“Okay, can one of us offer to buy the other coffee before this get more awkward?”

“Yeah, I’ll do that.”

“Thank you.”

“What do you want?”

“Caramel macchiato.”

“Whipped cream?”

“Yes please.”

“...”

“. . . I’m sorry but how old are you?”

“I’m eighteen.”

“Sorry.”

“No, I get it a lot. Late bloomer and all that.”

“Yeah, it’s just that my roommate set this up and I don’t know how the app works and—”

“And I look like a kid.”

“... yeah.”

***

“You’re Lily?”

“How’d you know?”

“You look like the most uncomfortable person in this cafe. First time using a dating app?”

“Yeah...”

“Someone else filled everything else out for you?”

“My roommate.”

“That would explain the profile description.”

“The what now?”

“It’s a little blurb right below the portrait, supposed to describe the sort of person you are and what you’re looking for.”

“What does mine say?”

“I think it’s best that you look at it yourself.”

“...”

“...”

“I’m going to kill my roommate.”

“Reasonable enough. I don’t know of how much of it’s made up, but I think I should start this off by saying that I’m not willing to tie you up, beat your thighs black and blue, and then turn the rest of your legs to jelly. I’m sex-repulsed asexual, and have no idea how we got matched together.”

“Yeah, and I need to change this right now. Where’s the edit button?”

“Here, give me your phone.”

“No, I just need to—”

“Listen, a friend of mine forced me to block out an afternoon for meeting new people and this is going to be easier than trying to make small talk with a complete stranger. Now come on, let me work my magic.”

***

“Taylor?”

“Lily?”

“That’s me.”

“. . . if I can ask, when did you swipe right?”

“Because you looked cute and had a not-creepy profile?”

“Thank god.”

“. . . is there something I should be worried about?”

“My friend made my first profile for me and it wasn’t great.”

“Blonde?”

“How’d you guess?”

“My friend did the same.”

“...”

“...”

“Can I get you a cup of tea?”

“Of course.”

“...”

“...”

“So, what do you do for a living?”

“Can I plead the fifth?”

“Is it criminal?”

“Are you a cop?”

“Why does that matter?”

“You have to tell me if you’re a cop.”

“That’s actually not true.”

“It is if you want to use your legally-granted powers.”

“I was asking you what your job is.”

“And I’m asking you if. You. Are. A cop.”

“I work in law enforcement, yes.”

“This date is over.”

***

“Sophia?”

“Lily?”

“Yeah. So, I’m a cop, gay, not looking for just a domme, not  _ not _ looking for a domme, and—”

“I’m a cop, bi, and a domme.”

“Fantastic. Want to get dinner?”

“Do you like Animal Planet?”

“Nope.”

***

“Oh, I’m sorry!”

“No, after you.”

“There’s only one Sprite left.”

“I can get Seven-Up. My friends won’t be able to tell the difference.”

“Okay.”

“...”

“...”

“I’m sorry, you’re very pretty.”

“You think so?”

“...”

“Of course, you just said so. Sorry.”

“No, I’m sorry. It’s a bit much for someone you’ve met in the soft drink section of a grocery store.”

“A little, but I liked it.”

“. . . are you doing anything later?”

“Uh, no?”

“Because my friends and I are kinda throwing a party to celebrate the end of mid-sems, and if the awkwardness shock is going to let me keep speaking I figured I should kinda try to ask you out.”

“Yes.”

“Really?”

“Yes yes yes.”

“Okay.”

“. . .”

“. . .”

“What’s your name?”

“Right! I’m Sabah. You?”

“Lily.”


End file.
